UPDATE: Body of missing diver recovered off Marblehead coast

A four-hour search for a scuba diver missing in waters off the Marblehead coast came to a tragic end around 2:30 p.m., a spokesman for the Massachusetts State Police.

Staff Reporter William J. Dowd wdowd@wickedlocal.com @WJD_MHDReporter

A four-hour search for a scuba diver missing in waters off the Marblehead coast has come to a tragic end, a spokesman for the Massachusetts State Police told the Reporter's news partner, WCVB.

State Police divers recovered the man's body at about 2:30 p.m., spokesman David Procopio told WCVB. The diver's body was found about two miles off of Marblehead Harbor in about 50 to 60 feet of water, Procopio said.

In an email, Carrie Kimball-Monahan, spokesman for the office of Essex County District Attorney Jonathan Blodgett, also confirmed the death, identifying the man as a 58-year-old Westfield resident whose name was being withheld pending notification of his next of kin.

Kimball-Monahan called the death an "apparent drowning" and said that foul play is not suspected.

However, she added that the cause and manner of the death would be determined by the Office of the Chief Medical Examiner and that the circumstances of the diver's death remain under investigation.

Massachusetts State Police detectives assigned to the Essex District Attorney's Office responded to the scene "as per protocol," Kimball-Monahan wrote.

"The man was scallop diving with two other men near Satan's Rock in Salem Sound," she explained. "At approximately 10:15 a.m., the driver of the boat called in 'diver down' to the Marblehead harbormaster after one of the divers failed to surface."

The Marblehead harbormaster and Marblehead Police were the first to respond.

According to U.S Coast Guard press release, the man's family had reported him overdue to return home. His boat was found docked in Marblehead, according to WCVB.

Local responders, the Coast Guard and others began searching in the waters off the Marblehead a little after 10:30 a.m. The Massachusetts State Police dive team recovered the body four hours later, according to both Procopio and Kimball-Monahan.

Marblehead Harbormaster Webb Russell explained during the early stages of the search that divers were working in groups of three in a closed perimeter of 60-foot water off Satan Rock.

According to Russell, the missing man was in a group of three divers, two of whom had surfaced and realized the third member of the group was missing.

As 1 p.m. approached, a crowd at the State Street landing had begun to grow. One Marblehead woman said that divers harvest scallops in the water this time of year.

Marblehead resident Ed Butler, a trained diver who had been watching the activity at the landing for an hour, said rescue crews were working in cold and murky waters with strong currents, which the diver who had gone missing also had to contend with.

"You can only hope for the best," he added.

According a 10:35 a.m. post on the Marblehead Police Department's Facebook page, crews on the Marblehead harbormaster's patrol boats and the new Marblehead public safety emergency response boat were sent to the area of Satan Rock behind Children's Island.

Also responding were personnel from the Salem Harbormaster's Department, Beverly Fire Department Dive Rescue team, Coast Guard and the Massachusetts Environmental Police, according to police, while police and EMTs stood by at the State Street Landing.

Later, the North Eastern Massachusetts Law Enforcement Council's Police Dive Team out of Salem and a Coast Guard rescue helicopter headed to the scene to aid in the search for the missing diver.

According to a post at 11:49 a.m., multiple public safety divers from Beverly and Salem were still in the water conducting search-and-rescue operations at that time.

The police added at 12:19 p.m. that the State Police were sending additional rescue divers and side-scan sonar equipment to the scene. Calling the search "still active," the police urged boaters in the area to give the search area "a wide berth."

With the search extending into the afternoon, parents of children attending the Lynch-van Otterloo YMCA's day camp on Children's Island were informed that children would be diverted to the Corinthian Yacht Club, 1 Nahant St., with the YMCA stationing staff both at the State Street landing to direct parents and at the Corinthian, where parents would be picking up their children.

The Coast Guard in the Northeast performs an average of 2,500 search-and-rescue cases each year, the Coast Guard noted.

The Reporter will update this story as more information becomes available.